In a distribution process for articles, there are wholesalers and sellers operating between shipment of articles and delivery of the articles to consumers, and each of the wholesalers and sellers has inventory. When stock of inventory is held for a long time, it causes not only a delay in earning a profit but also increases inventory unit cost due to additional expenses such as warehouse storage charges, and as a result, profit may be reduced even if articles in stock are sold, and furthermore, even a loss may be caused. Accordingly, in order to realize efficient distribution of articles, it is desirable to prevent having stock at more than a necessary level, and therefore it is important to perform appropriate inventory management. Today, there are widespread inventory management systems using a computer, which contribute to improvement in the working efficiency for inventory management (for example, see the abstract of Japanese Published Unexamined Patent Application No. 5-120313).
At wholesalers and sellers, inventory management is generally performed by each department or each salesperson. Therefore, even articles stocked for a long time are generally handled (sold, disposed of or continuously managed as inventory) by the responsible department or salesperson.